Friday March 25th, 2016 Tokyo, Japan

Today is the first of two full days in Tokyo before we head home on Sunday. We had originally booked an all-day tour to Mount Fuji, but given my still very shaky condition we had to cancel. I feel really bad for causing the trip to be cancelled. 

Breakfast in the clubroom provide a great selection (maybe things aren’t deteriorating after all?) - though I only managed tea and a piece of toast. Over breakfast we hatched a rough plan for the day; a visit to the old Tokyo Tower and the Ginza shopping district. We also decided that we would use the subway, so this required a bit more study and the download of a great app before we finally set off. 

We made our way to the subway station beneath the hotel and stood in front of the large map trying to figure out which lines and stops would get us to our destination. Then we had to work with the ticket machine, the trick here is to find the button to change the screen to English – after that it’s not that complicated. The final hurdle is then to figure out which platform to go to – this required the assistance of a helpful station employee.

After a couple of stops and changes we arrived at the station closest to the Tokyo Tower; the thing to note about making your way out of a subway station in most major cities is that there are many exits and if you pick the wrong one you can find yourself a very long way from your intended destination. We found the posted map which lists the nearby attractions for each labeled exit, and then followed the signs for our selected way out. Emerging from the subterranean world of the underground we were rewarded with the site of the Tokyo Tower rising from behind some nearby buildings.

Even though we had visited the tower on a previous trip it was still a thrill to ride the elevator up to the two-story main observatory located at 490 ft; we also paid the small additional fee to ride up to the smaller special observatory at a height of 819 ft. The tower was built in 1958 as a communications and observation facility located in the Shiba-koen district. At 1,092 ft, it is the second-tallest building in Japan. The structure is an Eiffel Tower-inspired lattice tower that is painted white and international orange to comply with air safety regulations. Even though it was a slightly overcast day the views were still very impressive.

From the tower we made our may to the adjacent Zōjō-ji temple where we hoped to visit the cemetery – the guide on our previous trip had told us this was the burial place of several Shoguns, in fact six of the 15 Tokugawa shoguns are buried here so we thought it was worth a visit. The temple and was originally founded in 1393 but the present buildings date mainly to just after the Second World War. Unfortunately we found the entrance to the cemetery was closed and even though we could have figured out a way in, we respected the intent of the gate and chose pass by.

Following another successful navigation of the subway system we emerged in the Ginza district – famous for high-end shopping. Part of our mission on this excursion was to try and locate a backstreet Tempura restaurant that we ate in on our first visit to Tokyo several years ago, we were not successful – which was just as well as I had committed to myself to never eat Japanese food again following my incident in Kyoto. 

We walked the main street and gawked at the shops, it’s a bit like a Japanese Oxford Street, or 5th Avenue. Somehow we found ourselves trinket shopping in the home of Hello Kitty, Sanrio World – I have to admit to just not understanding the fascination of it all. Tired and in need of a sit down we darted into a Chinese restaurant on the upper level of Sanrio World (Chinese food in Japan – what were we thinking!). The food was mediocre I think, but I’m only guessing because I just moved it around my plate as I was still not up for eating anything.

Back at the hotel I slept for a few hours and in the interest of keeping things low key we had dinner at the restaurant located in the hotel lobby. The Italian-themed restaurant turned out to serve quite decent food and the place is very popular with Japanese clients – though super-expensive.